Half of IT Workers Sleep on the Job

Stony Stevenson writes "According to a new online survey by Harris Interactive, more than half of IT workers say they've fallen asleep at work, while nearly half of techies also are apparently in the mood for love. Forty-seven percent of tech pros admit they've kissed a co-worker, according to the online survey of 5,700 U.S. workers, including 163 techies. The survey didn't indicate if those work taboos were committed by the same respondents, but in both cases, men were more likely to admit doing both. Forty-nine percent of male techies say they've fallen asleep at work, while only 35 percent of women admitted doing so."

Sounds like techies aren't getting enough sleep.

[Vellmont]

sleep debt [wikipedia.org] is a real phenomenon, and if you're falling asleep at work, you've likely got a large amount of it.

Many people think falling asleep is a sign of "laziness". That's just nonsense, it just means that person needs to get more sleep, or get better quality sleep!

90% of IT workers

[Kizzle]

lie on surveys.

Naps!

[kabdib]

As an Old Fart, I often take half hour naps in the early afternoon. I'm lucky to have worked mostly at companies with private offices (with doors that lock), but I've done this in cube farms, too.

After thirty minutes of down-time, I grab a cup of coffee and hit the afternoon refreshed, thinking clearly and less stressed.

Civilized societies have siestas.

Re:Not always due to laziness or lack of work...

[Seumas]

Of course, for every nap on the job, I suspect there are a half dozen sleepless nights where an engineer had to cover for an emergency, fix something, help with a high priority client, fly somewhere for an urgent fix, cover a sick employee or return from vacation early. Sorry, but I don't feel guilty if I take a nap here and there when I also often work double shifts, put in seven day weeks (sometimes multiple weeks in a row), cover for staff shortages, log in remotely while on vacation in a hotel, from the family house on thanksgiving, from my home at 3am. . .

Just people trying to offer more excuses as to why they need to outsource jobs overseas, because of incompetent, undereducated, lazy American employees.

Re:Overworked and out of our element

[SirSlud]

Well, it never bothers them that you do. I'm sure some realize it. After 9 years of programming, I have just decided to under promise, over deliver. Lose a contract, or not get promoted? Fuck it, its not worth it. Sanity is worth it. In the end, somebody will pay you for making quality products or providing quality services without having to live at work. So I say it'll be fixed by tomorrow afternoon, and fix it at 10am. They'll be more appreciative, and you got more sleep so you can clock more quality work hours. I like to say that 25% of the skill of a developer is managing expectations. *Technically*, we could write a word processor in assembly on 386, but telling somebody who is responsible for purchasing computer equipment and software tools that is suicide. Having people realize how fucking hard and taxing your job is and how challenging it is to fix things that appear small to a customer or designer is key to keeping people around you happy to provide you the proper environment to kick ass.

One other thing that people forget is that frequently the problems that crop up that programmers and IT folks have to fix are problems that may not have occurred had the work force been better rested. Near the end of a particular development cycle, we were working 12 to 14 hour shifts 6 or 7 days a week, alternating between folks during the day and folks at night. Near gold, it was basically a team would come in and have to fix the bug caused by the folks the earlier 12 hour shift caused fixing another bug. Everyone was so overworked that nobody could make rational steps towards fixing things properly. Seemed to me that we could have finished off earlier were we not pressed into 'work every hour you're awake' mode for the last 4 weeks. You end up causing problems that you then have to stay up even more hours to fix.

If your clients dont know when you fix things or do things for them, change that. Send them an email timestamped at 1am when you fix the problem. Mention it offhand when you discuss the resolution of the problem. You'd be surprised how willing people are to compromise or help you change the situation so you don't need to be on call for them 24/7 .. they might cut you some slack on short term hack jobs to create better long term infrastructure, monitoring, fixes, etc.

A good tip on staying awake

[Cryacin]

I hear you mate. I've been in the IT industry for 15 years, and in software development for the last 8. I used to work insane hours when I ran my own show and studied at university. (Up to 20 hrs a day, 13 days a fortnight) I used to have energy, I used to have go, but that was all about adrenaline baby. That was back before 2004... I WANTED to work insane hours, but couldn't... I NEVER had energy, so I resorted to drinking fridge fulls of V. (Like red bull for those non-Australian types) But of course, like any good IT nerd, I kept on going. By about 2006 after 2 deaths in my family, I realised something. It's just not worth redlining yourself, all day every day. Yes, this situation was rather extreme, but we all suffer from it. What is the "it"? A lack of BALANCE. Balance is definitely a buzzword that's thrown around at every given opportunity, but this is what I mean by balance: If: 1. You keep on pushing your waking hours 2. You eat crap 3. You drink crap 4. You sit down in front of the PC all day, every day You are abusing your most valuable tool... your brain. NEWSFLASH!!! Your brain is part of your body. Abuse your body, transitively, you abuse your brain. I moved to Sydney after a stint of work in the US (And yes, it was hammer and tongs again) and am now working for a corporate. (Not as bad as it sounds, and no, I'm not a sellout). A friend of mine once said to me that when you live in a big city, your legs are your best form of transport. I took that to heart, and pay a bit extra to live in the gucci suburb that my employer is, but live about 3km (about 2 miles for the yanks) away from work, AND WALK THERE EVERY DAY AND HOME EVERY NIGHT. I also discovered this wonderful thing called s-l-e-e-p. Yes. Sleep. I make myself get at least 9 hrs a night, no matter what. "Oh, but I haven't got time to sleep". WRONG. You don't have time not to. You're just robbing yourself of your next day's productivity. For all those party animals out there, this applies to you too, not just the workaholics. "Unwinding" is good, but not at the cost of sleep. I can't stress this enough. I also discovered this wonderful thing called a w-e-e-k-e-n-d. Yes, a weekend. Very important. Remember the whole "Unwinding" thing I was talking about? Well, this is a good time to do it. Also, see sleep. Another good time to do that too. With this whole taking time out of my busy work schedule, you'd think that I've dropped in my productivity. Not true. My rate of productivity has increased so much, that in 5 days ~10 hrs a day work, I do MORE than when I was working 13/14 days ~14 hrs a day. IF you have to work long hours, and there is just no way around it, for god's sake. DON'T GO OUT. Sleep comes before "unwinding". Furthermore... EAT WELL. Especially during these times. If you eat well, you will be healthy. Remember your body? It's like a car. If you run it on premium, fill it with oil and take good care of it, guess what... IT WILL KEEP WORKING. If not, it will break, along with that valuable tool called your brain. By eating well, I don't mean "raw vegetables", "vegetable juice" blah blah blah crap crap crap. I mean 3 square meals a day, low on fat. Wu. How hard. Learn to like sushi, stir fry and the like. Avoid Mc Crap-alls. They just sell greaseball food units. Which brings me on to the last thing. Drinks... or should I say the wonderdrug... Caffeeine. Caffeeine keeps you awake... for now. In large enough doses, it also gives you insomnia, which in turn ROBS YOUR NEXT DAY. Stay off it unless you really need it. IT IS A DRUG. (Albeit valuable, but treat it as such.) And yes, my parents harped on me since I was 12 to live like this, my friends harped on me, several girlfriends that actually gave a damn about me said the same thing. Well, after years of stubborn denial, I have admitted defeat on all the arguments.

Re:I Believe It

[aca_broj_1]

Shortly after I quit smoking, I realized the same thing. If you smoke regularly, you get the regular hourly ten minute break, once you stop, the breaks stop as well. It took me at least three months to realize that the reason I was less productive was not the post-quitting stress, but in actuality the lack of breaks. I have since started to take hourly breaks no matter what I do, and its made a world of difference.

Re:Power napping!

[jollyreaper]

I'm not built for napping. For starters, if I try to doze off it usually takes me a long time. If I'm in a boring meeting, it's much easier. Hell, if the meeting is at the end of the day and I'm just trying to hold off so I can get home, by the time I'm home I no longer feel the need. If I DO manage to sleep during the middle of the day, it usually throws me completely off. I'll end up sleeping for maybe four hours before popping awake, then I'm not able to crash at a normal time that night and I can end up sleeping extra long. I usually do seven hours but if my sleep pattern is disturbed, like with a nap, I could end up sleeping for 10 hours. It's very weird.

I don't disbelieve the benefits of getting a good nap in, I just don't think I'm physiologically capable of it.

Lies, damned lies, and Slashdot statistics

[MoxFulder]

According to a new online survey by Harris Interactive, more than half of IT workers say they've fallen asleep at work ... Forty-nine percent of male techies say they've fallen asleep at work, while only 35 percent of women admitted doing so.

Hmmm... less than half of male techs have fallen asleep at work, and less than half of female techs have fallen asleep at work.

And yet, somehow, more than half of all techs have fallen asleep at work. Gosh, that's interesting. Those non-male non-female techs sure must do a lot of sleeping on the job!

Re:I Believe It

[i.r.id10t]

I work on a college campus, its great. The women I work with all go and exercise at the gym for 45 min or so, all of us guys take a walk a class change time to check out the "scenery". Sorta miss the camel toe craze from a couple of years ago, although there are always hotties out and about...